Thanks to the Cold War Kickstarter we very recently added some new variant character cards to the store, allowing you to use existing characters in new and exciting ways! Specific Supremes can be used with any of their appropriate cards, their regular or Special Cards, giving added game-play choice and adding Team-building and tactical options for players.

Arquero (Cold War) As Arquero comes to terms with the legacy he represents, he has been taken under the wing of the returned Supreme Alliance. This has caused him to move away from the shadowy path he was following, to become the hero he was meant to be.

As well as adding the Supreme Alliance Faction affiliation, Arquero’s Alignment becomes Hero only. His main change though is his new Legacy Hero Power, which gives Arquero a bonus to Action Rolls when he is within 6 inches of a Friendly Supreme Alliance Supreme!

ChernobogPerun’s dark ‘brother’, Chernobog was summoned to the earthly plane by Baroque. He has allied himself with the Red Republik, but secretly heeds the whispered call of the Forgotten.

A variant character for the Perun mini, Chernobog is a separate character for Team-building purposes. Hard-hitting like Perun, he swaps Air and Water Elements for Darkness and Fire (Living foes beware!). Umber Bolt has Pull EFX which synergizes with his Powers, turning Chernobog into a dangerous ‘tar pit’. Finally, Umber Vortex wreaks havoc with clustered models!

Perun (Cold War) The Cold War version of Perun represents the Hero among his staunchest allies, as the current Perun picks up his predecessor’s mantle in the time-displaced team.

This card makes two key changes to Perun: in this version, he is not a Freelancer, and his Stormcaller Power is replaced by the more defensive Stormwall. Stormwall adds durability for Perun and Friendly models in Base to Base at the cost of some offensive capability, but Perun remains a heavy-hitter even in this version.

Sister Bedlam (Coven) After years of using her dark science to heal and harm, Sister Bedlam’s criminality caught up with her. Now back from the dead, she has joined the Coven, and once again pursues her diabolical research into life and death.

The Coven version of Sister Bedlam’s card has her as NonLiving, but most importantly changes her Power. Through Dark Mercy, Sister Bedlam remains in play as long as she has nearby models to transfer Damage to if she is KO’ed. This Power can be used as often as needed, so she really benefits from Minion allies.

Tangent (Cold War) A second-generation sleeper agent, deep conditioning laid down by Professor Hammer’s machinations decades earlier has now asserted itself in Tangent. The anger and bitterness has today been usurped by a loyalty to Hammer that she strains against.

As well as adding an extra Supreme to the array of Red Republik choices (without having to use Honorary Member), Tangent replaces More Than luck with Sleeper Agent; this can generate 1 power Up die per Round for Tangent adding even greater supply of dice for her signature Tangents ability!

These cards reflect the directions characters are growing in and we will add more alternative Special Cards as the Pulp City storyline continues to unfold!

Beginning with a look at Powerhouses, we are relaunching Behind the Mask as occasional features to give insights into different types of Supremes based on Role or in-game function.

Powerhousesare the ‘big guys’ (and girls!) of Pulp City. They are larger and hit harder than most other models, and can soak up heavy punishment. In basic terms, if you want a Supreme to take the fight to your opponent, then a Powerhouse is your best option. Every Faction has access to a Powerhouse, and Hero and Villain Team builds have plenty of options. The flip-side to that is that typically a Team can only include one Powerhouse, and most Powerhouses cost 3 Levels.

Powerhouses have a few key common strengths. Their Attack Traits tend to be exceptionally good. This means they have a good chance of hurting even the toughest Tank or Leader. In addition, most Powerhouses have at least one Action that is an area effect of some type (usually either an Overrun or Pulse). Finally, they can often unload a lot of dice in Attack, backed up by their Role Power which turns 4, 5 or 6 results into EFX on a successful Attack. Their biggest weakness for opponents to exploit is that they usually have at least one low value defensive Trait.

Die-pooling is key for Powerhouses, underscored by the fact they do not add Action Points (AP) like other Roles. Instead, they generate a personal pool of Power Up dice each Round, typically 2 to 4 dice. Therefore it is vital to ensure the rest of your Team generates the AP you need to make maximum use of what will likely be your hardest-hitting model – Support Supremes are vital here. It also means you will want to manage their Power Up resource well. Generally, because of their Role Power, you will more often create EFX offensively than cancelling EFX defensively with a Powerhouse. Therefore, it makes a certain amount of sense to use them mainly for Attacks. It may be worthwhile to assume 2 Power Up dice per each EFX you want to achieve on an Attack. Something else to consider is that if you haven’t previously used a Powerhouse, they will often peak in terms of Power Up die pool in the second.

Powerhouses can offer an incredibly destructive option for your Team, but you need to make other choices around them to ensure plenty of AP to fuel their Actions. They can be harder to fit in Teams playing lower Encounter Level games as they are the equivalent of two or three other Supremes, however if you time their Attacks well they can easily leave an unsuspecting opponent in disarray within a single Activation, rapidly turning the tide of battle.

Dead Eye is the unofficial Leader and focal point of Pulp City’s Supreme vigilantes, those mostly working outside Heavy Metal, Blood Watch and even the Way. He has been on the Supreme front line since he first reappeared in public view, trying to atone for his personal fall from grace. A great tactician, Dead Eye is an unwavering defender of Pulp City equally adept at inspiring others as well as bringing the smack-down to any who threaten his home town!

Dead Eye combines personal courage, cyber enhanced strength, and a tactical acumen that impresses even C.O.R.E. If you like the kind of Leader who is always at the forefront of conflict then Dead Eye might be for you.

Dead Eye has high strength and an outstanding melee Action: Power Smash. This allows him to use the Smash It Up bonus and hit people with cars etc. for an extra die. He also has a ranged Ray Action, allowing him to hit multiple models at once. Finally, Walk It Off allows him to remove Stun and Suppress from friendly models, a useful counter-measure especially against Necroplane and Coven who use Suppress often.

Perhaps his biggest strength is his Tactics Power, allowing another friendly model to Activate directly after Dead Eye’s first Activation every round – an incredibly potent tool for setting up combos. His Faction Leader Card gives bonuses to any friendly model attacking models of higher Level, excellent when fielding a number of Level 1 Supremes, or to help counter an enemy Powerhouse.

Dead Eye works great with the Hero Starter set, as they are all effectively Indy Hero’s and represents a smart way to quickly bring your team up to Level 9. Add in Dead Eye’s favorite Minions the Vigilantes for more board control (they benefit from extra dice against Enemies when in Dead Eye’s Team), and really kick things off.

Dead Eye can be found in the web-store here: Dead Eye (link) – his game card can be viewed in-store

Vigilantes can be found in the web-store here: Vigilantes (link) – their game card can be viewed in-store

A being of madness made flesh. This recent arrival to the ranks of Pulp City’s Supremes was once a crooked lawyer named Eric Hanson, a man with a bloodthirsty streak he kept hidden until Dead Eye brought him to justice. Now, he has begun to consolidate a power base around the ruins of Ashville Asylum. 100 Voices spreads madness and chaos in his wake and seems to control the minds of those around him. His ultimate goals are not yet clear.

Why should you be using 100 Voices in your Team?

Madness, chaos, and the ability to do the unpredictable are the main advantages of 100 Voices. He has access to Mind Control as well as a powerful and versatile de-buff Action; His Mind Control Action (Whispers) has synergy with Voicelings being in Base to Base with the target, allowing 100 Voices to roll an extra die. His final Exclusive Action allows friends and enemy’s alike to perform free attacks against models in Base to Base. This ability is wildly fun, and often unpredictable. 100 Voices is a powerful psychic and works well against Nature teams and especially models with low Spirit Trait as they may be forced to use their Spirit value in place of their normal Trait when Attacking.

Time to look at the Supreme Cards (details may still vary after the open beta):

Looks familiar? Good!

This is the side you will be seeing when buying a blister. It tells you pretty much everything that you need to recruit the model.

By looking at the card, you know Howler’s Level, faction and subfaction. The new things: base size, Minion+(how many Minion levels the Supreme brings to the team – yes, Resources you knew are gone) and AP+ (how many AP does the Supreme generate for team – gone is the old mechanic of level based AP generation).

Now, let’s turn the card to its gaming side.

The beauty of the new PC cards is that all info is one side of it. You will waste no time flipping the cards.

Let’s look at the top bar (the dark grey). Each model has its type clearly stated: Howler is Living, but you will also find Non-Living, Mechanical, E.T. and Outsider or any combination of them. This allows you quickly to assess what models get affected by certain Actions. The new icon represents movement – now Supremes and Minions will have different movement values – previous Blitzer bonuses are incorporated in one stat. Howler can Sprint – which is a default movement type – but other Supremes will be able to Fly, Blink, Bound or Wallcrawl.

Each Supreme comes with a selection of Powers. The first one is always a Role Power, so Howler will share his Blaster Power with Ace of Wraiths, Tangent and other Blasters. Then each Supreme gets one Power per level. One for Howler, sorry amigo. As you see in his case, he may still do what he used to do (and much more as you will soon find out) but there is much less text on the card to go through.

The light grey area might be something of a surprise to all Pulp City players. Gone are skills and team powers, welcome Powers section that combines both and puts all of the needed information on the card and not inside the book.

But first, Actions. Each Supreme has access to 3 Actions. There are no universal Actions anymore. But the way Actions work now (see next Editorial Eye), you actually end up having more choices then before. Howler can blast his guns with two Projectile Actions and surprise his enemies with a Reaction when Targeted by enemy (Reaction is a new type of Action that may be triggered when models are charged, shot at etc.).

Catch the next Editorial Eye to get familiar with the Action Roll – probably the biggest change t0 the game mechanics.

When we looked at simplifying the way Supremes worked one of our first mandates was being able to pick up a Supreme Card and know what that Supreme does. The Role defines what a Supreme does on the table. Not only does the Role define what a Supreme does it also offers a bonus to that Role to make it better at its job.

What are the Roles?

There are eight different Roles in Supreme Edition. Just by seeing the Role listed on a card you will know right away how a Supreme will function on the table.

Blaster: Ranged combat masters. They get bonuses as long as they are not in Base to Base with Enemy Models. Examples: Ace of Wraiths and Tangent

Brawler: The melee fighters. They get bonuses when engaged with an enemy in Base to Base contact. Examples: Crimson Oni and Hellsmith

Tank: Tanks are a support Supreme; they usually have a powerful attack and lots of Damage. Friendly models can transfer Damage suffered to a Tank in Base to Base. Examples: Iron Train and Rook

Speeder: Speed is the name of the game for these Supremes. They can move a third time each round, making them exceptional Objective takers. Examples: Androida and Night Fright

Infiltrator: Ninjas! These guys can begin the game anywhere on the tabletop, except the enemy deployment zone. Examples: Chimp Chi and Shadow Mask.

Support: These guys provide powerful buff to the team, though are very weak on their own. They supply Bonus AP when surround be their team. Examples Red Riding Hoodoo and Sister Bedlam.

Leader: The big team leaders you know and love! They can bring with them a Leader Card unlocking further boost and team powers to enhance a Sub-faction or Origin Themed Team. Examples: C.O.R.E. and Mysterious Man.

Powerhouse: These guys are the real damage dealers. They generate more attack successes than just about any other role. Example: Six Feet Under, Father Oak.

Roles and Team Building

Supreme Edition is going to see bigger games as you can run them more effectively. We expect to see a Level 12 Encounter become the normal size for a Pulp City game. One of the things we’ve changed is to allow you to take any combination of Supreme levels. So if you want 12 Level 1 Supremes that’s legal. The only restriction is that you can only have a single Leader, and a single Powerhouse. Other than that you’re free to do as you will.

This is possible because of how the Roles balance out against one another. If you want to bring a Level 3 Leader and a Level 3 Powerhouse and your opponent brings 6 Level 1 Supremes this is a legal game now. Be warned though having the right mix of Roles is going to be CRITICAL. You’ll want a Support Supreme to add AP. But Supports are dangerously squishy, so you’ll probably want to bring a Tank to protect them. If you bring a Powerhouse they add zero AP to the team so you’ll really need a support or two to keep them going. Of course if you wanted you could just bring a bunch of Infiltrators and Speeders. They bring a good number of AP and are relatively self-sufficient. But then you lack staying power. We’ve run multiple test games to find out that a healthy mix of Supremes that work well with each other.

What does it mean for you, Citizen?

So if this is starting to sound a little like your favorite MMORPG you might be right. There is a kind of simplicity that Roles give us that really helps keep things balanced and focused. This means less wall of text on the card, and more fun on the table. From a design perspective it allows us to have each Supreme really excel at doing one thing.

But just because a character is a Brawler don’t expect them to lack ranged attacks. In fact Guerilla is a Brawler but 2 of his 3 Actions are Ranged Attacks. In addition his Powers boost his ranged ability making him very formidable with his minigun, even if he’s really a Brawler.

Expect to see a lot of talk about the perfect mix of Roles in a team. There is no right formula but a solid grasp of what each Role does is going to allow you to build a team of Supremes that operate exactly how you want them to.

In this series of short editorials, we would like to bring you some insight into the creative process that took the bigger part of our 2012.

These editorials will lead to the big reveal – the open beta, starting later this January.

Why Pulp City: Supreme Edition?

Because both us and our fans wanted a faster, more succinct and straight-forward engine to battle it out with our and their Supremes. Not that the old one was broken – it was, just like every other game, becoming overgrown with model specific rules.

First stage was asking the question: What makes Pulp City unique (and thus needs to be kept)?

In my humble opinion, the true value of the game engine is shown in the very first demo game you play. Are you familiar with the game after 10 minutes after? Would it be too daunting to shove the demo guy aside and take control of your models?

Our aim was to make the basics super simple and not prone to interpretation. Rules that read like a mathematical equation but play like a cinematic picture.

Playing a Supreme is all about the power choice. All Pulp City players know the awesome feeling when their model grabs another model and tosses it across the battlefield. But first edition needed a specific Action for this to happen. Our goal was to imprint the myriad of choices into simple equations. The same Action can do the heroic throw or go for hyper damage. One Action, many outcomes, you decide.

Somewhere on the West Coast, there is the glamorous Pulp City. Please come and visit us! Well, that is what I am supposed to say. The truth is: stay away for as long as you can! Corrupted, money-driven and bloody dangerous, Pulp City is a place to avoid unless you want to be a witness of alien invasions, undead monstrosities parading in the daylight or insane killer robots slaughtering your friends. And that is all just for the starters…

Welcome to the Pulp City World where powerful Heroes clash with evil Villains!

Pulp City is the precious child of our twisted minds. It is born of our love for both miniature games and comic books. It’s fast, it’s furious and smart. It’s your own The Good, the Bad and the Ugly meets Godzilla.

First, we invite you to play a game that is heroic and character driven. Pulp City does not create a new world. It recreates a storyline with familiar elements of our favorites from pulp entertainment, TV series, B movies and of course comic books!

Take a walk down the crowded Sunset Blvd. Pulp City is as hot and humid as Miami before a storm. Pulp City is as dangerous as New York City before Giuliani. Crave for the sea breeze and the shade of palm trees and pray you don’t end up in the middle of the clash between Villains and Heroes.

Choose from the deadliest Supremes of Pulp City. Build your team of elite Villains or noble Heroes. This is the only “army choice” we’ll ask you to make. If you feel like picking a theme for your Supremes, go for the rebelling apes or brooding supernatural hunters. Or mix them any way you like.

And last, but not least, good news for you: Pulp City does not have a huge “door fee.” It is a true skirmish game that works perfectly with 6-8 models a side, as few as 2 models, or many more if your prefer for truly cataclysmic battles!

The game is about strategy and resource management. You will soon learn that having a Team built without a Support Supreme is tempting but risky. In a Game Round, you may never be able to perform all the Actions you would like, so prioritizing them is the key to winning.

With frequent updates, we’ll provide you with new models, brilliant art, and lots of ideas that shape the Pulp City setting. So get ready to protect or imperil Pulp City in the coming months from alien invasions, necroplagues from an outer dimension, invasions from beneath the earth’s surface and all your favorite pulp events!